My Blog has Moved to freethoughtblogs.com since 1 November 2011

Sunday, January 23, 2011

What has charitable status have to do with anything?

Skeptical Science posted the call for emergency support for the Council of Ex-Muslims of Britain on its site.

PW commented: 'They don’t have a charity no. I’m not a fan of giving money to people who I have no idea who they are or what they do with the money I give.'

My response is:

I am not sure what not having charitable status has to do with organisations not knowing who they are or what they need funds for. We are an organisation with very clear aims – coming out in the open and renouncing Islam and religion in order to break the taboo and challenge the Islamist movement that punishes apostasy with death. It is very much like gays coming out of the closet. Yes religion or atheism is a private matter but not when you can get killed for it. Then coming out becomes a form of resistance…

This has nothing to do with having charitable status. Religion is a charitable object but not what we do. The charity commission has said that we cannot become a charity since we promote secularism. Plus there are many organisations such as the National Secular Society and Amnesty International that don’t have charitable status because of the charity commission’s narrow rules – that doesn’t make them worthless organisations.

If PW is so desperate to fund charities irrespective of their aims – or believes that only charitable organisations have aims that are worthy of support – there is always the Sharia Council or the Muslim Council of Britain which he can fund….